The highest recognition for us is being recognised for the quality of our services.

Recognition & Accreditation

Recognition

Licence by the Ministry of Education

IST has been awarded a licence to operate as a College by the Ministry of Education in compliance to the Law 3696/2008 as modified by Law 3848/2010. IST’s Lisence of Operation was last renewed on 5th of August 2013 (108250/IA, National Gazette 1986 B’).

According to the law, Colleges are allowed to enter into collaborations with foreign Universities with a view to implementing their programmes of study and awarding their qualifications.

The degrees awarded by foreign Universities are recognised in Greece through the Ministerial Decree 38/2010.

More specifically, Article 50, paragraph 3, states the following : ‘In cases of justified doubt, where evidence of formal qualifications, as defined in Article 3 (1) (c), has been issued by a competent authority in a Member State and includes training received in whole or in part in an establishment legally established in the territory of another Member State, the host Member State shall be entitled to verify with the competent body in the Member State of origin of the award :

whether the training course at the establishment which provided the training has been formally certified by the educational establishment based in the Member State of origin of the award

whether the evidence of formal qualifications issued is the same as that which would have been awarded if the course had been followed entirely in the Member State of origin of the award

whether the evidence of formal qualifications confers the same professional rights in the territory of the Member State of origin of the award

IST graduates meet all the above stated requirements according to the letters they receive from the foreign Universities.

Audits and Assessment of Quality

Our quality assurance system is assessed and certified on a regular basis by international independent quality assurance organisations.

ISO 9001:2008

he International Standards Organisation Lloyd’s Register Quality Assurance (LRQA) monitors the quality of the services provided and has certified IST with ISO 9001:2008 for the “design and implementation of university level programmes’.

BAC

In 2001, IST was first accredited by the British Accreditation Council for Further and Higher Education (BAC) as ‘an institution providing higher education’. BAC is the council responsible for inspecting all UK Universities and their collaborations abroad. IST scored excellent in all areas audited.

NARIC

IST graduates are provided with the specific certificate along with their degrees which clearly states that ‘holders of British degrees who have studied at Colleges members of the Hellenic Colleges Association are conferred academic and professional rights which apply to the entire European Union’.

NARIC is the British DOATAP and signed a collaboration agreement with the Hellenic Colleges Association in 2006 to provide the NARIC certificate to its graduates wishing to acquire the specific certificate along with their degrees.

QAA

The Quality Assurance Agency of Great Britain (QAA) examines quality assurance mechanisms applied both at IST and the collaborating British Universities. The outcomes of the audits conducted continually indicate that the level of studies at IST is by all means equal to that of the collaborating UK Universities.

Recognition of Professional Qualifications

Holders of EU University degrees have had full recognition of their professional rights since 1989 in Europe according to the EU Directive 48/89. In 2010, through the Ministerial Decree 38 and, most recently, through Law 4111/2013, the Directive 36/2005 was incorporated in the Greek Legislation. All necessary measures have been taken to ensure the successful implementation of EU regulations over the recognition of professional qualifications, including compliance with the decisions of the EU Court, so that holders of franchised degrees awarded by other Member-States are entitled to work in Greece under the same conditions as those pertaining to holders of degrees awarded by Greek Universities.

Degrees awarded by Colleges must be granted professional equivalence to those degrees awarded by the Greek formal education system. The body in charge is the Council for the Recognition of Professional Qualifications (SAEP). Thus, the professional qualifications of our graduates are safeguarded and all obstacles around the legal practice of their professions have been suspended. In practice, this allows college graduates holding degrees acquired through collaborations with EU Universities to work both in the public and private sectors in Greece as do Greek University graduates.

Our graduates meet all the above mentioned requirements and have vast prospects of employment and further academic development.

As such, following a recent decision of the Council for the Recognition of Professional Qualifications (SAEP) of the Ministry of Education, an IST’s graduate was granted professional equivalence of the degree, "Bachelor of Science in Accounting and Management Information Systems" of the University of Hertfordshire (United Kingdom), to the degree of graduates of the Accounting and Finance faculty of the Athens University of Economics & Business, in the context of the national education system, with the terms and conditions of the current Greek legislation, without any additional compensational measures.

It is worth noting that, already, in the last few months, several degree recognitions have been granted and a large number of IST’s graduates have followed the procedures required by the Greek legislation for the recognition of professional degree equivalence, waiting for SAEP’s decision.

NB. 1: The degree and transcripts must be submitted in photocopies which have been validated and translated by the British Council (Kolonaki Sq. 10673 17, tel.: 210 3692333), replacing the requirement to carry the APOSTILLE. For any further information, please visit the links of the British Council.

NB. 2: The syllabus can be submitted to SAEP either in English or in Greek and is provided to those expressing an interest by the cooperating University after consultation with the College’s Registrar Office.